Rose Barron, Suspected Detroit Serial Killer – 1905, Michigan

FULL TEXT (Article 1 of 5): Detroit. Jan. 25. – Evidence was brought to light to-day which convinces the police that Mrs. Rose Barron is one of the most heartless monomaniacs ever arrested. It is alleged that she has administered arsenic within the last few months to the members of ten families in Detroit, many of whom narrowly escaped death. She is held on a charge of having put arsenic in food used in the dining-room of the Alhambra apartments, where fourteen persons were poisoned last week.

Mrs. Barron stoutly maintains her innocence, but the police say the evidence against her is overwhelming.

Several members of her own family died under suspicious circumstances, and it is believed she murdered them for the insurance they carried.

[“Poisoning Is Mania Of Woman - Puts Arsenic Into the Food of Ten Families.” The San Francisco Call (Ca.), Jan. 26, 1905, p. 1]

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FULL TEXT (Article 2 of 5): Detroit, Jan. 27. – Mrs. Rose Barron, who is said to have been in the employ of four families whose members have been poisoned, was arrested yesterday on suspicion of having been implicated in the poisoning of twelve patrons of the cafe in the Alhambra flats, who were taken violently ill after luncheon last Thursday. Mrs. Barron was employed as a scrubwoman in the cafe, and left there Wednesday night. In her work she had access to the kitchen, in which was the can of baking powder that City Chemist Hayward found contained arsenic. In three of the four families for which Mrs. Barron worked or which were supplied with her culinary products, symptoms of arsenical poisoning are said to have developed. The police say Mrs. Barron’s father died very suddenly eighteen months ago.

[“Woman Wholesale Poisoner - Suspected of  Having Given Arsenic to Cafe Patrons and Families.” The Salina Evening Journal (Ks.), Jan. 27, 1905, p. 1]

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FULL TEXT (Article 3 of 5): Detroit, Mich., May 15. – After remaining out fifteen hours the recorders' court jury in the case of Mrs. Rose Barron, charged with placing arsenic in the baking powder at the Alhamhra flats cafe, disagreed and was discharged. Twenty people were made sick at the flat, though all recovered. The defense advanced the theory of ptomaine poisoning. Mrs. Barron had been employed at the cafe and had been dismissed.

[“The Jury Disagreed.” Pittston Gazette (Pa.), May 15, 1905, p. 2]

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FULL TEXT (Article 4 of 5): Detroit, Mich., May 16. Mrs. Rose Barron, accused of mingling poison in food served Alhambra dwellers, will, in all probability, be put on trial again. The prosecution, while declining to commit itself to a positive statement that the charge will be pushed, still has a good deal of faith in its case, despite the fact that on the disagreement of the jury in Judge Phelan's court the vote stood seven for conviction and five for acquittal. Charles S. Abbott, her counsel, expects to see the case brought to trial again, but hopes that a motion for the release of his client on a reasonable bail will prevail.

[“Try Rose Barron Again.” The Yale Compositor (Mi.), May 19, 1905, p. 3]

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EXCERPT (Article 5 of 5): [Merrie Hoover Abbott’s] most noted criminal case was that of Rose Barron, who was accused of poisoning nineteen persons, patrons of the Alhambra. Mrs. Abbott represented the defendant in the trial, which lasted for forty days and in which many experts testified. The jury disagreed and finally Mrs. Abbott obtained the freedom of her client.

[Clarence Monroe Burton, William Stocking, Gordon K. Miller, The City of Detroit, Michigan, 1701-1922, Volume 3, 1922, S. J. Clarke, Detroit, p. 543]

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